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Today I like the word "bottom" in the 18th century meaning as a term of high praise meaning grit and determination and balance.
As in "He possessed a great deal of bottom. A few months later, he proposed again and was accepted."
I never would have guessed such a meaning for the word bottom.
In the U.K. bottom has morphed into “front”, as in, “He’s got some front.”
It means nerve, cheek, or audacity, a kind of amalgam of moxie and chutzpah, with the accent on chutzpah.
If you were selling your car, and asking $10,000, and someone offered $5,750, you’d say, “Jeez, that guy’s got more front than Brighton”, or in the U.S., more front than Miami Beach.
It means nerve, cheek, or audacity, a kind of amalgam of moxie and chutzpah, with the accent on chutzpah.
I like bounder, for me a classic U.K. term like beggar-man or rogue, where I'm picturing some awful, ugly Dickens character bounding over a wall to skulk into a royal coronation.
I like the phrase "stupidly optimistic". That fits my mindset well, and has usually served me well in life.
Good one. I like "eternal optimist" because you just never know.
Quote:
Originally Posted by banjomike
Have I mentioned I like the word "limpid"?
I heard it for the first time from my Granddad, who was a dedicated fisherman. He used it to describe a mountain lake we had spent hours hiking to so we could fish it.
The water was so clear I could see big trout swimming next to the bottom when a passing cloud blocked the glare of the sun from the water. Big lake trout, stalking all the little bottom-dwellers in the river weeds and grasses that covered the bottom. I have no idea how deep that water was, but it felt deep when I walked out in it from the shore.
Ever since, that image has defined 'limpid' for me.
Sounds lovely. I looked limpid up. Seems I'm not the only one that has mixed it up with limpet.
Reminds me of languid, which reminds me of Mae West.
But today I like dödprat - a Swedish word literally meaning "dead talk" but really meaning "small talk" because in Sweden, small talk is seen as a futile waste of time.
[quote=LilyMae521;60349976]
But today I like dödprat - a Swedish word literally meaning "dead talk" but really meaning "small talk" because in Sweden, small talk is seen as a futile waste of time.
/quote]
Reading my car insurance policy: "Phantom land motor vehicle". That expression is mind-bending in so many ways. It means a non-airplane non-boat non-stagecoach that influenced a driver to have an accident, then ephemerated, or ephemeresced.
I came across a phrase that I’d never heard before, and I thought, ‘That’s not bad, I may use that.’
I called my younger son, and his wife answered his cell, she said, “He can’t hold his phone at the moment, he cut his finger while chopping a courgette, (that’s a zucchini to you).
“Ouch” I said, “was it bad, is he okay?”
“Yes he’s fine, but it bled like a Bob Dylan song.”
“A Bob Dylan song?”, I said, “how does that work?”
She said, “I thought that it would never stop!”
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